Venezia. Sitting outside at Caffé Florian, the historical coffee bar and sidewalk café that hugs the arcades along St. Mark's Square in Venice. My favorite moment in time is a late springtime afternoon, with people and pigeons wandering about in the Piazza foreground, orchestra and violin music playing in the background  with a good book at hand, a white tablecloth setting with heavy silver, crystal, glasses and cups; coffee, chocolate, cookies and finger-snack tea sandwiches on the table. Paradise!

The perfect place to watch the personality of the world unfold, rise and fall. No wonder this special spot is called "the drawing room of the world."

Where would you like to live?

Where I live, New Orleans and Palm Beach, but I also love Palm Springs and Key West. One of my favorite fantasies is to discard all my possessions at a house sale, pack one duffle bag and live aboard a classic wooden sailing schooner venturing to different ports of call, but I get seasick and am afraid of falling overboard.

What is your idea of earthly happiness?

The smell of roses and coffee and a fireplace in every room; sunrise and sunset over the ocean; the sound of waves lapping.

What are your greatest fears?

Probably a tie between snakes, flying, heights, fanatics, fascism and a resurrection of McCarthyism.

I am a flaming redhead (a reformed bottle blonde) with blue eyes - prone to sudden lapses of blondness! Yes, I change my hair color a lot. I am 5’8" in Von Dutch sneakers and cowboy boots but like towering high heels, shoes and boots with all types of divergent heel heights and shapes.

I like to sport a layered downtown/uptown hybrid-mix look. My fashion style is an idiosyncratic hodgepodge combo of femininity and androgyny, topped with interesting accents. A woman can never have too many accessories. I love vintage doodads. I am not into the art of understatement.

I wish I could do a perfect cartwheel and dance classical ballet; however, I was kicked out of ballet class at age five for my inability to do a backwards or forward somersault  I remember the teacher’s name, Olga of Russia.

What and where were you happiest?

As a sunburned child at the ocean with my dogs and a tuna fish sandwich.

What are your favorite animals?

Hmmm… Dogs first, then a toss up between lions, tigers, elephants, monkeys and zebras, followed by wolves and carousel horses.

(Parody!)

What is your favorite meal?

Char-grilled Kosher hotdog or hamburger with a no-salt straight-up Margarita (oops...hmmm...just give me the bun and condiments, as I no longer eat meat); peanut butter eaten straight from the jar is a second runner-up, and Spaghetti Marinara paired with bubbly champagne comes in third.

What satisfies your sweet tooth?

Snickers Bars and Peanut M & Ms. I admit, I am a carbohydrate and junk-food junkie. Cotton candy and marshmallows make me melt.

What is your favorite breakfast?

Buttered crumpets and jam or a hot donut.

What is your current state of mind?

Unpredictable.

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I would love to have a lyrical accent, preferably English or French.

What are your favorite events to attend?

Mardi Gras parades, cookouts, second-line parades, Jazz funerals (as long as it is not my own), plus I like dogsledding and rock concerts.

What do you do for exercise?

I hate exercise, especially group activities. I flunked aerobics 101, as I jump the wrong direction as everyone else and fall off the step boxes. The best exercise is tromping around and maneuvering the French Quarter in high heels. But I would like to learn boxing and fencing. I think I am a natural.

What do you consider your great achievement?

The commitment of taking care of my mother and pets through extended illnesses, nursing them and keeping them going for far longer than anyone ever expected.

What are your most treasured possessions?

My dear darling doggies. My oldest is Dud, a little dog with the heart of a Lab in a tiny body. I also love old jewelry with an intriguing past, a history and a story.

What do you consider the lowest depth of misery?

The death of someone I love; the loss of a pet; the loss of a home; the loss of a city.

What are your most marked characteristics?

Resourceful, rebellious, tenacious and unafraid to voice my opinions.

What is the quality you most like in a man?

A mischievous sparkle in the eye and a great sense of humor.

What is the quality you most like in a woman?

A strong voice and handshake.

What do you value most in your friends?

The ability to lend a shoulder, empathize, sympathize, laugh, listen and then say nothing.

Out of Africa, Casablanca, The English Patient, The Wizard of Oz, Bonnie and Clyde, Schindler’s List, The African Queen, The Birds, Annie Hall, To Kill a Mockingbird, March of the Penguins, The Godfather, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Psycho, Dr. Zhivago, The Great Gatsby, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, 21 Grams, The Maltese Falcon, North by Northwest, Citizen Kane, Some Like it Hot, Titanic, All About Eve, Lawrence of Arabia, the Grapes of Wrath, A Streetcar Named Desire, Avatar, Midnight Cowboy, Easy Rider, Sunset Boulevard, Enchanted April, Ben Hur, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

The French Quarter, hands down, its fun and festive  warm, inviting and intimate  with the friendliest shopkeepers and best eclectic stores anywhere. I love it. The streets are crammed with endless treasures, everything from used knickknacks to chi-chi couture and Louis XVI antiques.

Name something unusual people would never suspect about you?

I was a fire-baton twirling majorette. Once upon a time I was a "Rose" at Ireland's Rose of Tralee International Festival. In my life I’ve been both poor and broke (yes, there is a difference). I fight opponents like a scorched earth gladiator. When I was a toddler I bit strangers in the bum. I have memories of my second birthday. My favorite stroller was a laundromat cart. I love bumper cars. I am good on stilts and a pogo stick. You never want to receive one of my poison pen letters. I’ve always wanted to be a spy or a roller derby queen. I inherited a love of crazy weather and desolate places off-season. The snarled branches of my ancestral family tree entwine with Daniel Boone and southeastern Kentucky's mysterious Melungeons.

Anything else?

There’s always more to the story. I believe in miracles. I am a daredevil in disguise. I can scream like a Banshee. I keep a secret stash of "mad money" like granny said Southern woman must do. I take in and mother stray pets and people. I am stubborn and prone to a one-track mind that thinks of a million things at once. I was a kid barrel racer on a Palomino pony named Silver. When I was 13 my nickname was "Venus" and I pretended to be 21. I was a "wild child," still am. I love to vacuum/scrub/clean house with a toothbrush. (In the Victorian era, I think I was a Gosford Park Irish domestic servant and scullery maid in another life.) I don't cook. I don't understand cooking or kitchen utensils. I know how to make three delicious things in one cast-iron skillet. Fry-pan hot dogs, biscuits and crispy pancakes. Like Tom Petty says, I don’t back down. I keep a peacock carousel "horse" named Gertrude in my bathroom. I am an ex-surfer girl who never could stand up on my surfboard. I like the underdog, the black horse, the long shot. I never plan ahead or "book early." I instinctively lean the wrong way on motorcycles and snowmobiles. I do not understand eating dinner at 6 p.m.  10 p.m. or later suits me better  so I like all-night diners.

When you were a kid, what were the worst jobs you ever had?

Picking tomatoes in rural
Florida
for my grandmother, fearful of snakes. Baiting fishing lines at a tackle shop. Manning my parents’ flea market booth. Mowing neighborhood lawns. Working at a bowling alley renting out shoes, while the cool girls at school made fun of me.

Flip a coin. Seriously. If I am really unsure about something, I toss a quarter and leave it to the fates. I love it; it immediately takes the worry and pressure off. It's sort of like divine intervention. There are no infallible crystal balls, so when it comes to two options I often leave it to chance. The outcome is unpredictable yet good odds rest best with pure luck.

What do you think about gossip?

Scandalous people and gossip make the world revolve. My grandmother sits on one shoulder saying, "If you can't think of something nice, don't say anything at all." Truman Capote sits on the other shoulder saying, "If you can't think of anything nice to say about anyone, come sit by me." All literature is gossip.

The Dolphin. Swimming with ruthless sharks... I will never be a shark. I am a dolphin. Dolphins grin a lot, like to frolic...they represent wisdom and trust, the spiritual and esoteric...and they are very smart...however, they do have teeth, and can use them. Dolphins are héroes and healers. People love dolphins. Never underestimate the power of a dolphin. Sharks are afraid of dolphins and that's for good reason. Sharks are voracious but dolphins are smarter than you think! Sharks are cold-blooded...dolphins are warm-blooded...

What is your heritage?

My historically diverse and mixed ancestry is deeply rooted in Colonial America, from Jamestown to Salem, and the Southern society of the "Old South." I have many deeply flawed "crazy" ancestors. I descend from a long line of deeply-flawed colorful characters and riches to rags  and rags to riches  fabled tales that have a mythic quality that echoes Greek tragedy. My own life is a classic Tennessee William play, a continuum, set in umpteen acts. I live an over-the-top Southern Gothic life that no novelist would ever dare to pen. I am an ultimate survivor, in the face of adversity.

How would you like to die?

Fly off into the sky on a parrot-head umbrella and evaporate into a twinkling star.

What is your motto?

Be careful of what you wish for because you just might get it.

More "TJ Fisher" details about gossip and fact can be found at tjfisher.net.